The Relation of Man to the Hierarchies

The Relation of Man to the Hierarchies

Schmidt Number: S-3302

On-line since: 8th June, 2012

This is the 9th of 10 lectures given by Rudolf Steiner at Dornach,
in November of 1916. The title of this series of lectures is:
The Karma of Human Vocation as related to Goethe's Life.
They were published in German as:
Das Karma des Befurs des Menschen in Anknuepfung an Goethes Leben.
Kosmische und menschliche Geschichte.

This lecture appears in the book:
The Karma of Human Vocation.
It is presented here with the kind permission of the Rudolf Steiner
Nachlassverwaltung, Dornach, Switzerland. From Bn/GA 172. The London
Reference number is, S-3302.

Thanks to the kindness of an anonymous donor, this lecture has been made available to everyone.

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Lecture by Rudolf Steiner

Dornach, 19th November, 1916.
Shorthand Report unrevised by the Lecturer. For the
preceding lectures of this Course on the
‘Karma of Vocations,’ see Anthroposophical Movement,
Vol. IV, Nos. 37, 38, 41, 44, 46, 49 and 51.

Lecture by Rudolf Steiner

Dornach, 26th November, 1916.

Shorthand report unrevised by the Lecturer. All rights reserved by
Philosophisch-Anthroposophischer Verlag
Dornach. English translation by G. Kaufmann, edited by H. Collison.

O

NE reproach among others is often
levelled at our Spiritual Science by theologians and others who
believe — though they do not comprehend it — that they
are standing on the true ground of Christianity. This Spiritual
Science, they say, alleges truths concerning a whole number of
Hierarchies, with Beings existing in the spiritual World,
higher than man. For, as you know, we do speak of the spiritual
Hierarchies, including the Angels, Archangels, Archai, Exusiai
and so on. We speak of these kingdoms of the super-sensible
Worlds just as we speak of the animal kingdom, the plant
kingdom, the mineral kingdom, the elemental kingdom, and
so on, in the earthly world. We know that the life of man falls
into two halves. One of them takes its course between birth and
death. During this life — or through this life
— man comes down from the super-sensible World into the
kingdoms which he then finds in his physical environment: the
human kingdom, the animal kingdom, the plant kingdom, the
mineral kingdom and so on. And when he passes through the
gate of death the other section of his life begins. He then
rises to the higher kingdoms which tower upward stage by stage
from below, just as the kingdoms of Nature descend from above.
He rises to the Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai, etc.

Nowadays, as I said, there are those who imagine — though
they really do not comprehend it — that they
themselves are standing on the ground of Christianity.
And they direct their attacks especially against this idea of
spiritual Beings between man and the Godhead — Beings who
occupy the super-sensible spaces between the human being and the
essential Godhead, who is not only far above man but far
above the Angeloi, Archangeloi and the rest. Those above all
who think themselves especially advanced in their Christian
conception are very prone to say that this science of spiritual
Hierarchies and Beings is a lapse into some old Polytheism, or,
as they say, into a kind of Paganism. According to them, it is
precisely the task of the man of to-day to place absolutely
nothing between himself and the Godhead. Man shall live in this
world, open his eyes to all that appears to his senses,
and find his way directly to the Godhead, without any mediation
through Angels, Archangels or the like. Many people hold that
this is especially sublime: to stand face to face with one's
God without any intermediates at all.

We
hear this objection hurled at Spiritual Science from very many
quarters. It only bears witness to the fact that in the circles
whence it comes there is absolutely no knowledge of the
spiritual needs of our time. For it is really not the question
whether a man imagines that he of himself can find the way to
his God. The question is whether, as a matter of fact, he can
do so. The question is, not whether he imagines that he is
thinking of his God, but whether he is really doing so. We from
our point of view must ask, what are they really
conceiving, who imagine that they are thinking of their
God when they declare: ‘We will have none of your mediation
through other spiritual Beings; we will rise from our own souls
straight to our God.’ What are they conceiving in reality? Is
it really God whom they conceive when they think or speak of
God? Are they conceiving what the word God must mean when the
human being rightly speaks of his God? No, they are not. What
they are conceiving is altogether different. Let us go through
all the ideas and conceptions such people have of their God:
what do these ideas describe? None other than the being
of an Angel — an Angelos. All those who declare that they
look up directly from their soul to God — in reality they
are only looking up to an Angel-being. You may search through
all their descriptions — however sublime they sound
— and you will find they are describing no more than an
Angel. Really, what these people say amounts to the
demand that we shall conceive as God nothing higher than
an Angel. For instance, what is called God in modern
Protestantism — the God of whom so much is said in
Protestant quarters — is one of the Angeloi and nothing
more than that. For the point is not whether one imagines that
one is finding one's way to the highest God. The point is
whether one is really doing so. Along these lines man only
finds the way to his Angelos. I say again, to his
Angelos — that is important.

Take to begin with the Beings of the lowest Hierarchies: the
Archai (or Spirits of Personality as we have called them),
Archangeloi (Archangels) and Angeloi (Angels). Thereafter comes
man, then the animal kingdom, the plant kingdom, the mineral
kingdom.

Archai
............

Spirits of
Personality

Archangeloi
...

Archangels

Angeloi
..........

Angels

Man

Animal

Plant

Mineral

Take only these, the lowest Beings. We need but remember what
we have often described before. We know that the Archai or
Spirits of Personality are also the Time-Spirits. We to-day are
living in a different spiritual context than the old
Greeks or Romans. We are under a different Time-Spirit. Such a
Spirit of the Time is a sublime Being. Then again we have those
Beings whom we call Archangels. Their mission is to bring about
harmony among men on Earth. Hence in a certain sense they
are the guides and leaders of the Folks and Nations. And the
Angeloi — the Beings immediately above man —
it is they who lead man through the gate of death. They lead
him on and on, so that in a sense he has his Angelos beside him
from death to a new birth. Then they lead him again into a new
life on Earth. It is the mission of the Angeloi to lead the
individual human being through his repeated lives on Earth.

Thence we come down to man himself. Man, as he now is on
Earth, only remembers his earthly life in the physical body.
The memory of the Angels goes much farther, for only so can
they guide and direct the repeated earthly lives of men. The
modern theologian does not even rightly conceive the
Angel, for at the very outset he omits this property whereby
the Angel guides the human individuality through his repeated
lives on Earth.

All
this must be borne in mind. Not until we come to the Archangels
do we stand face to face with Beings who regulate the
relationships among men. And the Time-Spirits regulate these
relationships over long epochs of time. The Angels on the
other hand are essentially those Beings who regulate the
life of the individual. Bearing all this in mind we shall not
fail to see that it is a hidden egoism on the part of men to
wish to rise immediately to God. In truth, though they will not
admit it, they only want to rise to their God —
that is to say, to their own Angel.

This is of great practical significance. For it bears a
certain seed within it, namely this: They speak of ‘the one
God,’ but that is only a fanciful imagination on their
part. In real truth, when they give themselves up to this
fancy, every one of them is speaking of his own God,
namely, of his Angel. And as an inevitable consequence,
in course of time each one will worship his
own God, namely his Angel. Indeed we can see how strong is the
tendency of men to-day for every one to worship his own God.
The finding their way together in those Gods who are common to
all has become very slight indeed in modern time. The
emphasis of every one on his own God has become more and more
prominent. The human race is becoming automatised. It is as
though the mere name of ‘God’
remained. It sounds the same, for all who share a common
language, but with the one word every one conceives something
different, namely his own Angel. He does not even rise to the
Archangel who guides the communities of men.

Underlying it is a hidden egoism, which men will not confess.
But it is of no little importance to realise the fact. For the
human being is living in an untruth when he does not admit, ‘I
am looking up to my Angel,’ but says to himself, ‘I am
looking up to the one and unique God.’ He is living in a nebulous
conception, that is, in an illusion, a Maya of the inner life,
and this involves important consequences. For when a man
gives himself up to this inward illusion something
quite definite takes place. We do not alter the spiritual facts
by giving ourselves up to fanciful ideas. The spiritual
facts ensue, whether we think rightly or wrongly. A man looks
up only to his Angel, but does not admit the fact. He imagines
that he is looking up to God, while in reality he is not
even looking up to an Archangel. By this untrue conception he
in a certain sense benumbs his soul; and this benumbing
of the soul is very common nowadays. But to benumb the soul is
the most detrimental thing of all in our present period of
human evolution. For when the soul is benumbed the Ego is
suppressed, the Ego is made dim, and then those other Powers
who ought not to be working in the soul creep in. That is to
say, in place of the Angel whom he first desired to worship
(whom he re-christened ‘God’) the Luciferic Angel
creeps in, and by and by man comes to worship not the
true Angel but the Luciferic Angel, and then the inclined plane
which leads him down is very near at hand. Then it is very near
at hand for him to deny God altogether, that is to say, to deny
his Angel. And this denial is always connected with the
denial of the true human Ego, of which I showed you an example
in the book
Matérialisme et Spiritualisme
by Leblais, wherein it is said that the cat has an Ego
just like any man, and there is also mention of a
‘Grandprêtre du chien.’

In
many respects we must admit that to the question, ‘Who is to
blame for the materialism of our time?’ this answer must be
given: The religions are to blame — the religious faiths.
For they darken the consciousness of men, putting an Angel in
the place of God; and for this Angel the corresponding
Luciferic Angel is then substituted. And the Luciferic Angel
quickly leads the human being into materialism. Such is the
hidden connection. In their arrogance and egoism the
religious faiths will not hear of anything beyond the
Angel. With measureless conceit they say that they are speaking
of God while all the time they are only speaking of an Angel,
and not even that completely. This measureless arrogance
— though they would often describe it as humility —
was in the long run bound to produce materialism.

If
we bear this in mind, we recognise a significant connection.
Through the false interpretation of an Angel as God, the
tendency to materialism arises in the human soul. Underlying it
is an unconscious egoism. On the one hand man shuns the task of
rising to a knowledge of the spiritual world. On the other hand
he would like to find a direct connection with his God, —
as it were, out of his own resources only.

You
will gain insight into many things that are working themselves
out in our time if you will bear in mind what I have here
indicated. There is only one safeguard against the
misinterpretation of God, and that is recognition
of the spiritual Hierarchies, for then one knows that the
religious faiths of to-day do not rise higher than the
Hierarchy of Angeloi.

At
this point we are still more or less within the limits of what
man develops as his conscious life. But there are many
things living unconsciously in man — or only dimly
conscious. So we may say: A man's connection with his Angel is
a real one, but his connection is no less real with the
Archangel Hierarchy and with the Hierarchy of the Archai. The
misinterpretation of the Angel, which takes place more or less
consciously, leads in its turn more or less consciously to the
world-conception of materialism — not in the single
individual, but in the epoch as a whole, it gradually leads to
this. Here we are still within the realm of that which happens
consciously in the soul. But when we come to man's relation to
the Archangel Hierarchy we are no longer in a realm of which he
has much knowledge. True, nowadays he often talks a lot
about it, but he knows very little. We do indeed have very
frequent confessions of faith nowadays — not in the
Archangel Hierarchy, but in one Archangel. There
may not be clearly expressed confessions of faith, but
there are inclinations to the one Archangel or the other,
inclinations of the feeling life. In the nineteenth century
this bore very copious fruit in one respect at least, namely in
the rise of the ideas of Nationality, which are an
unconscious outcome of the one-sided devotion to
one Archangel or another, overlooking the real co-operation of
the Archangels. Underlying this is a similar egoism, as
in the devotion to the one Angel, — only in this case it
is an egoism of the social life.

Now
we might also wish to describe what it is that goes
hand-in-hand with this socially selfish devotion to the
Archangel, just as materialism goes consciously hand-in-hand
with the misinterpretation of the Angel. But if we dwelt
on this subject we should be skating on thin ice, and that is
not exactly permissible to-day.

Still darker are the relations of men to the Archai — to
the Time-Spirits. These relations lie very far in the hidden
depths. As to the Angels, men do at least want to enter into
relation to them, though they do not admit the fact. Nevertheless,
when they say ‘I believe in God’ they do admit
it, wrongly, as I have shown. And with the Archangels they are
connected — wrongly, once more, in our time — in
their sentiment and feeling, inasmuch as they declare their
adherence to this or that group by blood-relationship or the
like. This leads into false paths which I will not, or cannot,
describe today. Similarly, men are led into false paths
in their relation to the Time-Spirits. Here too, they are
generally attached to the one Time-Spirit, who appears to them
as the spirit of their own particular age. You need only call
to mind how we endeavour in Spiritual Science to counteract
these self-centred notions by describing the successive epochs
of time, letting their several characteristics influence us, so
that we expand our heart and soul over all earthly evolution,
nay, over all cosmic evolution, thus gaining a relation,
in our thought at least, to many different Time-Spirits. But
the people of to-day want no such thing. We should have to
describe at length what we have here been hinting at, if we
would characterise the false paths along which men are led by
this their egoism in relation to the Time-Spirit. From a poetic
work I recently placed before you a sorry picture of our
present time — most tellingly described. Such
by-ways as are there described are connected with the false
relation to the Time-Spirit. But we are entering very profound
regions when we speak of the false paths in relation to the
Time-Spirit. When a man names his own Angel ‘God’
and is thus led from the true Angel to the Luciferic Angel,
it is an aberration of belief, of faith, of world-outlook.
Such aberration remains in a sense an individual matter. At
the next stage there can be the aberration of whole nations.
Yet even this is still no more, so to speak, than an aberration
amongst human beings, and the consequences are simply the
consequences of error among men. But when we reach up to the
Time-Spirit — when we err in relation to the
Time-Spirit — then do our aberrations begin to infringe
upon the cosmos. There is a mysterious connection between
man's errors in relation to the Time-Spirit and the
beginnings of those cosmic burdens with which he loads
himself, if I may put it in these words. Of course, if one
refuses in any case to look beyond the Angel, one will
see no such connection. What I shall now say, let everyone take
as he can. I say it out of profound investigations of
Spiritual Science, but I should have to speak for months if I
would relate these investigations in all detail.

The
errors man commits in relation to the Time-Spirit reach up into
the cosmic events, and the cosmic events hit back again. And
when cosmic processes — at any rate the beginnings
of them — are thus carried into human life, the result is
a decadence which goes so far as to attack even the
physical body. The consequence, in other words, are
illnesses, mortality, and all things of that kind. Perhaps in
no very distant future mankind will grow convinced of this.
Many a thing done by humanity on the physical plane, if it be
such as to offend against the Time-Spirit, invokes into the
evolution of the Earth destructive forces, the effects of which
extend even to sickness and death. With the insight which you
will now have gained you may ask yourselves whether it may not
be that some things which are happening in our own day are
errors against the Time-Spirit. Then perhaps you will be able
to give yourselves the answer, and you will recognise profound
connections, reaching even to disease and death, whereby
a compensation will be brought about for many a sin which man
is committing against the Spirit of the Time to-day.

We
can be well aware, needless to say, that the clever people of
to-day will only laugh at such statements as I have just
advanced. They, with their scientific world-conception, know
that it is nonsense (so they say) to believe that what a man
does, or what men do in their social relationships together,
can entail elemental consequences. But the time is not far
distant when men will believe this, for the simple reason that
they will witness it.

Our
time lacks the necessary earnestness for a genuine
world-outlook, able to sustain the life of man. It is one
of the first calls on every one who finds his way into
Spiritual Science, to develop this earnestness of
world-outlook, to enter a little more deeply into the course of
human evolution. How often have we emphasised the fact
that earthly evolution only receives its sense and
meaning through the Mystery of Golgotha. Indeed we have already
given many things, to reveal the Mystery of Golgotha in
its significance. But we must go on describing ever more
and more exactly, to recognise its full meaning. To-day men
sometimes ask, how does the human soul find its way to Christ?
And we may say, since Christ is a higher Being than all the
Archai, the way to Christ needs to be found. For by the way of
the ordinary religious faiths to-day, Christ is not found, but
as we have seen at most an Angel. In the name of the various
Angels, nay even of some Archangels (if the Luciferic
Archangels have usurped the place of the progressive ones) one
may indeed behave as men are now behaving; but never in
the name of Christ. It is an absolute impossibility for two
men, who stand in enmity against each other, both to confess
the Christ. Surely there is no difficulty in seeing that,
— it should go without saying. No doubt it may be possible
in the sense that one merely speaks the name: ‘Christ,
Christ’ or ‘Lord, Lord’ (as Christ Himself
already indicated) while all the time one is referring to one's
own Angel. But it is impossible if one is really speaking
of the Christ. Therefore the question may arise: how can the human
soul find a way to Christ at all? To gain instruction on this question
we could take various paths. Let us now choose one that re-suits
naturally from our recent considerations.

The
men of to-day know very little of the past. Above all, they do
not know why it is that certain things are handed down
traditionally. At most they know that they are handed
down, but why, they scarcely know. For instance (as you
may read to-day in all manner of exoteric books, and notably in
Masonic books), it is traditionally related that there were
Mysteries in ancient times, and that these Mysteries were so to
speak a secret institution, i.e., that in these Mysteries, as
the very word would indicate, secrets existed — real
secrets, even in the external sense. Certain traditions were
entrusted to whoever found access to the Mysteries. These
traditions he was under obligation to communicate to no
one save to those who were together with him in the self-same
Mysteries. It was the very strictest rule in those ancient
times that one must not betray the mystic communications. The
rule was thus expressed: it is one of the most punishable
offences for anyone to pronounce a secret of the
Mysteries before an uninitiated hearer. Nay more, it is one of
the most punishable offences for an unqualified person even to
listen to such a communication. So long as the Mysteries
existed in the ancient sense, this idea was carried out with
the strictest interpretation. Why was it so? Why did they do
this?

Nowadays, you see, there is much talk about the Mysteries,
especially among those who want to shine and sparkle a little
with their talk. Notably in those quarters where they talk of
these things in words, without even having the will to
understand, as is often the case in modern Freemasonry, much
harm is done by talking round these matters in the most
superficial way and with very little knowledge. Nowadays people
do not even notice whether these things are being truly spoken
of, out of the reality itself, or in mere words. Alas, one can
have the strangest experiences in such matters. I do not wish
to criticise, but the facts are far too serious, they must at
least be indicated. For instance, one can have this experience.
Some person is a member of one of those societies which call
themselves by all kinds of names — Brotherhoods, Keepers
of the Mysteries. Such a person comes to one (I am relating an
actual fact), questions one about the subject which seemingly
interests him, that is to say, interests him so far as the
words are concerned; but he can understand very little of it.
Then after a time one hears that he has been talking of these
matters in this or that quarter, and has been talking pretty
worthless nonsense.

Let
us now bring before our souls one characteristic —
concerning the customs and traditional procedure of the
Mysteries — which resulted from the real evolution of
mankind. How often have I emphasised the fact that
mankind has changed in the course of earthly evolution,
and that a most important incision took place at the time
when Christ went through the Mystery of Golgotha. To indicate
one important feature, among others that we have already
mentioned, we may say this: — Let us go back beyond the
Graeco-Latin epoch, or notably beyond the fourth century B.C.,
into the fifth, sixth or seventh century (so that we might even
remain within the Graeco-Latin time, — but we should find
it still more the case if we went back into the Egypto-Chaldean
or the Persian epoch). Everywhere we should find that that
which was spoken by man had quite another significance for
other men than it had in later times, say in the seventh or
eighth century after the Mystery of Golgotha. In the times when
the old atavistic properties of the soul were still existing
(leading up even to the old clairvoyance), the word which one
man spoke to another had an altogether different significance
from what it subsequently had, or what it has to-day. The word
itself, if I may say so, by its own inherent virtue, had a kind
of suggestive value. For much was still contained within it of
an inherited, Divine-spiritual force. When a man spoke, it was
as though the Angel from the Hierarchies was also speaking in
his word. Hence you may estimate that in those olden times
communications by word of mouth were very different from
what they are today. To-day, even if we are aware of all
these secrets, we have no possibility of speaking in words as
they did in those olden times. For we are bound to speak in
words by virtue of what the words have become through language.
For us, they are conventional signs. We can no longer go to
another human being and say to him with power as we could have
done in the third or fourth or fifth century B.C., ‘Thy Angel
loves thee,’ thereby letting a gentle thrill pass through his
soul, which was a force of healing. We can no longer do this.
The words have lost their virtue, they have lost their old
suggestive power. In olden times a power of human community
flowed from soul to soul when men spoke. Just as we breathe the
common air when we are together in such a hall as this, so did
there live in that which men spoke a spiritual power of
community. This has been lost in the progressive
evolution of mankind. The word has become more and more bereft
of the Divine. If you consider this, then you will also realise
that in those olden times there could be certain words and
sentences and formulae which had a greater influence than other
words — a greater influence than the words that were
commonly spoken. Such formulae of words, which had an influence
extending far beyond the commonplace, were handed down in the
sacred Mysteries. Now you can understand why they might never
be betrayed. For with his very knowledge of such formulae,
great power over other men was given to a human being. This
power must on no account be abused. It is an absolutely real
truth: When the old Hebrew temple-priest pronounced what in
ordinary life was called the ‘word’ (which in this case
contained a certain sequence of sounds) when he pronounced it
in the right way, then for the men to whom he spoke it actually
happened that another World was there around them —
spiritually speaking, but this spirituality was absolutely
real. For in those olden times it was so: every sequence of
sounds contained the corresponding power.

Thus you can understand, not only was it criminal to pronounce
the Mystery-formulae before an unauthorised person
— for one then wielded an unrighteous power over him
— but it was also anathema to listen, for the listener
himself would run the risk of falling completely under the
power of the speaker. These things are not so abstract as
certain people nowadays would fain describe them. They are very
real and concrete. But the times have changed, and we must have
an ear for the changing of the times. Since the Mystery of
Golgotha, words no longer have the same significance. For you
yourselves will recognise, true freedom could not have arisen
among men if words had preserved their old significance. Men
would always have remained a mere product, as it were, of
speech. Words had to lose this inner force. But then another
Force came into earthly evolution, which, if it found its true
relation to mankind, could by and by replace for men what once
had come to them out of the words. Out of their words, the men
of olden time had learned to think. Indeed, in olden time
there were no other thoughts than those that came out of the
words. But the power of thought could only come out of the
words so long as the words were such as I have now described
them. In the succeeding times this power was no longer
there. Then did there come that Being, who — if the
thoughts were filled with Him — could give the thoughts
this power back again. It was that Being who could say, I am
the Word. It was the Christ. But men must first find the
way to make Christ living in their souls. The Christ is there.
We know that He is there as a real Power since the Mystery of
Golgotha. And now that we are speaking about karma we shall
also show how He has His relation to karma. Where the
Angel only comes into relation to the one man, Christ can have
a far higher significance even than the Archangels, for
He not only unites men on the Earth according to the Spirit of
the Time; He also unites the living and the dead — the
souls that are organised here in the body and those that have
passed through the gate of death.

To
this end, however, we must first learn to understand a little
better how Christ may be found — or rather, how a way to
Him may be found — out of the Spirit of our Time. This is
the question from which we took our start. How can the
man of to-day find a way to Christ?

Above all, it is necessary for man once more to get beyond this
selfish living-in-his-own-soul alone. There is a true word in
the Gospels. (Alas, how many words of the Gospels are not taken
in their real truth, because they do not suit human
convenience!) It is this: ‘Where two are united together in My
name, there am I in the midst of them!’ The spirit of vain
mysticism which declares, ‘I will give birth to Christ in
mine own soul’ — that is not the spirit of Christianity.
The spirit of Christianity is that which speaks: ‘Where two are
united together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.’
But I would like to explain the full spirit of this saying in
connection with the repeated earthly lives of man, for that is
the intention of our present studies. I would apply it to our
time, and relate it to that life into which modern man is
placed by his calling or vocation. To do so, we must first
dwell on certain characteristic features. We must learn
to know what it is to get beyond this self-centred limitation
of each man to himself. In the Spirit of our Time we must get
beyond it, first and foremost by learning to understand
once more the cosmos with which man is related and out of
which man is born. We must learn to regard man in his relation
to the cosmos.

Do
you imagine that the Natural Science of to-day is able to
conceive the cosmos in relation to man? Remember Herman Grimm's
saying, which I have quoted even in public lectures:
Natural Science conceives the world as a kind of mechanism in
which there is simply no room for man. The natural-scientific
world-conception is quite unable to conceive man in
relation to the cosmos, for to do so one must first see
things concretely. Nowadays when a man constructs a
machine he imagines that the only thing that happens is that
the machine is built; or at most he will add to it what happens
by means of the machine, and that is all. But to give oneself
up to this belief is to cultivate — what is indeed
universal nowadays — what I would call negative
superstition. Superstition is the belief in
spirits where there are none, but it is also possible not to
believe in spirits where they are. That is
‘negative superstition.’ To this
negative superstition humanity to-day gives itself up
unstintingly — albeit, hitherto, quite
unawares — for men are not yet
accustomed to conceive, in relation to the whole universe
and subject to a moral point of view, those things which emerge
in human evolution. They think of them purely from the point of
view of mechanism.

Let
us take one example, characteristic of our time and
similar to many other things by which the outer life
today is largely ruled: the steam-engine. What a
tremendous part the steam-engine plays in our time! How many
things in our life are governed by it? You need only think of
all the things that would not be there if it were not for the
steam-engine. I do not say that all these things must
necessarily be produced by the steam-engine. The simple fact
is, very many things are produced by the steam-engine
nowadays, and that is according to the true spirit of the
time.

The
steam-engine was not properly invented until the 18th century,
for the attempts that existed before were not really applicable
in practice. What has become so universal and has attained such
immense significance, is in effect the steam-engine which was
made practicable by Newcomb in 1713 and by Watt in 1763. Not
until then were the former attempts turned to practical
account. Newcomb and Watt must be described as the
originators of the steam-engine in the sense in which one
speaks of it to-day, and of all that is connected with it.

Now
let us ask, to what is it really due — this possibility
of having steam-engines, which as you see is
comparatively recent? The year 1763 — what I now
say will sound very queer to anyone who thinks along the
lines of Natural Science — 1763, when Watt first raised
the steam-engine, so to speak, to its proper level, is very
nearly the year of the conception of Goethe's Faust. Maybe in
the further course of our studies we shall yet perceive
strange connections between the steam-engine and the conception
of Goethe's Faust, however far apart these things may lie. To
this end, however, we must first bring before our souls certain
facts connected with the entry of the steam-engine into human
evolution. Let us ask once more: To what is the steam-engine
really due? It is fundamentally due to the possibility of
creating a vacuum, or a space in which the air is highly
rarefied. The possibility of constructing steam-engines
lies in the creation and useful application of the vacuum.

In
times long past they used to speak of the
horror vacui
— fear of the void. They meant something quite objective.
They meant that space itself always wants to be filled with
something. An empty space cannot really be created; Nature has
a kind of horror of the void. This belief in the
horror vacui
first had to disappear from humanity; it had to be
possible to create a space in which the air is rarefied,
— a space approximately empty. Only then could one
proceed with the practical construction of steam-engines. The
air had to be eliminated from certain spaces.

Mechanical considerations will never lead us to a new
cosmic-moral conception as against the old cosmic-moral
conception of the
horror vacui.
Let us then ask ourselves, what really happens when we create
a vacuum or a space in which the air is rarefied, with the object
of placing what is achieved thereby, at the service of human
evolution on the Earth? The Bible tells us that Jehovah
breathed into man the living breath — the air — and
that thereby a living soul came into being. The air had
to be brought into man in order that he might become what he
was destined to become as earthly man. Through many hundreds of
years, nay, through the thousands of years, man only made use
of that rarefication and condensation of air which came about
of its own accord within the cosmic process. Then came the
modern age, and man himself began to rarefy the air; to get rid
of that which Jehovah had brought in; to counteract the way of
Jehovah's working, when He placed man on to the earth. What
happens therefore when man uses a space with rarefied air, that
is to say, when he banishes the air from a given space? It is a
case of opposition against someone. And now you will
readily conceive: Whereas Jehovah pours into man through
the warmth, man drives Jehovah away when he creates a space
where the air is rarefied. Hence, when the steam-engine is
constructed in this way, Ahriman gains the possibility of
establishing himself as a demonic being, even in the physical.
When we build steam-engines, we provide the opportunity for the
incarnation of demons. We need not believe in them if we do not
want to; but then we are negatively superstitious. Positive
superstition is to see spirits where there are none —
negative superstition is to deny them where they are. In the
steam-engine, Ahrimanic demons are actually brought to the
point of physical embodiment. That is to say, while the cosmos
descended with its spiritual content through that which was
poured into human evolution, the spirit of the cosmos is driven
away with this creation of demons. In other words, the great
and admirable progress of modern time has not only
brought us a demonology but a demonomagic. Modern technical
industry is in many respects demonomagic.

Many things become apparent — I shall now again say
something paradoxical — when we are rightly able to
read what is generally considered insignificant. After
all, in the letter i, materially speaking the line is
the most important part, and yet it is only the dot that makes
it i. How much less matter the dot contains than the
line, and yet without the dot it is not i. So in the
evolution of humanity, those who adhere to the material alone
will often only see that which contains materially a hundred
times more than the dot, and the dot they will fail to see. But
an intimate observer, who does not merely stare at the
phenomena but is able to read them truly, will learn to
interpret many things which appear only in the gentlest hints.
There is a strange fact which you will find indicated in the
biography of James Watt. The way I shall now refer to it will
no doubt seem mad to the enlightened modern man; but you must
first understand the true interpretation. Watt was not
able to carry out at once what he had intended with his
invention of the steam-engine. As we saw, the process took
place between 1713 and 1763. When someone makes an invention
people imitate it again and again, do they not? So there was
much construction going on during these years, and when Watt
had built his machine — efficiently, so far as its other
qualities were concerned, — he had included one
arrangement for which another man already had a patent. So he
was unable to carry it out. He had to think out another device
instead; and in a strange way he discovered it. In the time in
which he lived, the Copernican world-conception (which in
reality, as I have told you, answers only to the spirit of our
age) had long been accepted. And in real truth, Watt had the
idea to construct the whole device, the instrument of movement
which he needed, in such a way that he could name it the
‘Sun-and-Planet movement.’ He called it the
‘Sun-and-Planet movement,’ because he was actually
guided by the way the revolutions of the Planets round the Sun
are conceived in the Copernican system. So he brought down and
secreted into the steam-engine what had been recognised in modern
time as the movements of the Heavens!

Think now of what I recently told you, what will happen in the
future (for it is only now in the initial stages): how by the
summation of delicate vibrations great effects will be brought
about. On Earth, thank Heaven, this is not yet achieved! Yet
this is a beginning. The movement of the Sun and Planets is
here imitated. Do you imagine — considering how great is
the significance for the Earth of the Sun-and-Planetary
movement as it rays down on to the Earth — do you
imagine, when we imitate it here on a small scale and let it
ray out again into the cosmic spaces, that it is of no
significance? It is of very great significance for the
cosmos. Here you can see at once: even the vibrations are given
to the demon, whereby he may unfold his activity out into the
cosmic spaces.

No
one can sensibly imagine that this is meant to imply that the
steam-engine should be abolished. Many things would then have
to be abolished, for the steam-engine is by no means the most
demonic. Wherever electricity is applied, and many
another thing beside, there is far more of demonomagic; for
there we are dealing with many other forces which have still
more significance for the cosmos. Needless to say, anyone who
understands Spiritual Science will realise that these things
are not meant to be abolished. We cannot be reactionary or
conservative in the sense of resisting progress. In deed
and in truth, this demonomagic is progress, and the Earth will
yet undergo more and more of such advances. Man will succeed in
unfolding mighty effects into the cosmic spaces. It is
not a question of abolition — not even of hostile
criticism — for it goes without saying, these things are
justified. Yet, if on the one hand these things must emerge in
the progress of mankind, it is indeed a question on the other
hand of our creating counter-forces to bring about the
necessary balance. Compensating forces must be created, and
that can only be when humanity understands once more the
principle of Christ and finds the way to Christ. For a short
space of time mankind has been led away from Christ. Even those
who call themselves officially His representatives look
only for an Angel in the place of. Christ. But we shall have to
find the way of the soul to Christ Himself. For just as with
the demons of our machines we work out into the cosmos, even to
the physical stars, so must we find the way of the Spirit, out
into those worlds where man is between death and a new birth
and where the Beings of the Hierarchies are living. What I am
now hinting at is connected with what I explained before.
I told you on the one hand how men are entering more and
more into the karma of their vocations, such as I
described it, and how from the other side this karma must
be met by that understanding of the Spiritual World which
can in turn prepare our finding of a way to Christ Himself.
Of these things we shall continue in the next lecture.